External Recruiting
by Jedi Buttercup
Summary: Because they needed more gifted scientists who wouldn't freeze if they ran into armed aliens, of course.
1. Collateral Damage

**Title**: Collateral Damage 

**Author**: Jedi Buttercup

**Rating**: K+

**Summary**: SG-1, CSI. _An old friend confronts Jack while he's out recruiting for the program_. 900 words.

**Disclaimer**: The words are mine; the world is not. I claim nothing but the plot.

**Spoilers**: Vaguely post-season 5 for CSI and post-season 8 for SG-1.

**Notes**: For izhilzha, who requested "SG-1/CSI, Jack & Catherine, a not-so-chance meeting."

* * *

She leaned back against his car as he approached, arms crossed over her chest and defiance snapping in her eyes. Her disdain was as obvious as her aggressively displayed cleavage; if it weren't for the increasing thickness around his own waistline, evidence of life finally catching up to him since he'd been shuffled into a desk job, he might have thought he'd somehow been thrown back in time. (Not that accidental timetravel would be much of a surprise, all things considered).

"Catherine," he said, nodding solemnly as he came to a halt just out of arm's reach. He tugged off his sunglasses and folded them away in a pocket, then squinted at her against the setting sun. "To what do I owe the honor?"

She tossed her head a little, red-gold hair flaming in the dying sunlight as it fell back over her shoulder, and resettled her stance. "I don't know. Why don't you tell me, Jack?" she parried, uncrossing her arms enough to reveal a sheet of paper half-crumpled in one hand. It wasn't close enough for him to read what it said, but then again, he didn't need to; the seal at the top of the page made things clear enough.

He winced. "We're not going to _keep_ him, Catherine," he said, raising his hands placatingly and adopting his best wheedling tone. "We just want to borrow him for a little while. We'll return him good as new afterward, I swear."

"Uh-huh," she said, eyebrows raised in disbelief. "And that's why you didn't pick any of the perfectly qualified techs who do DNA work in _federal crime labs_-- you picked the young, single, _male_ CSI in _my_ department who's been doing_ field work_ the last few years. Spare me the platitudes. You and I both know Janet didn't die in any kind of accident or training mishap; my cousin was a _medical_ _doctor_ based out of _Colorado_ and she _still_ got killed doing whatever it is you're up to. No way are you stealing any of my guys and getting them involved, too."

"I think that's _his_ decision to make and not yours, Catherine," Jack replied, kicking himself silently for not realizing just _where_ the kid worked when he made the recommendation to put him on the shortlist. She must've spotted the letter at some point and xeroxed it. "Do you _know_ what the penalties are for interfering with the U.S. Mail?" he asked, only half jokingly.

"Can it, Jack," she said, unimpressed by the implied threat. "_Why?_ Why Greg? We've gone through hell the last few years to keep our team together, and he's an integral part of it. I _know_ you know what that's like; Janet talked about your team often enough, even if she'd never tell me what it was you did out there."

Why? he thought, wryly. Because they needed gifted scientists who wouldn't freeze if they ran into armed aliens, of course. She worked in Vegas; she ought to be able to suspend her sense of disbelief more than most people-- but unfortunately, she didn't have the clearance to be told. The powers that were might agree to spill the beans to Grissom if he signed a new confidentiality agreement-- the man had done some quiet consulting in the past, and the SGC would be eager to have a specialist of his caliber available for certain kinds of emergencies-- but not his subordinates.

"Your lab is the second best in the country, and your friend comes highly recommended," Jack said aloud, hands in his pockets. "We have a short-term need for people with his skills; when the project is over he'd be free to return. That's all there is to it. We aren't looking for cannon fodder or targeting your lab on purpose-- and if he decides to say no, we won't push. I sympathize with your losses, Catherine-- believe me, I do-- but this could be the opportunity of a lifetime for him."

"Like it was for Janet?" Catherine asked, bitterly.

Jack sighed. "I miss her too, you know," he said, then smiled a little, crookedly. "You should have kept in touch; Sam says Cassie asks about you sometimes."

Catherine snorted. "Don't give me that. And don't act like you regret it, either. Cassie writes me herself-- and I heard all about that CIA girlfriend of yours."

"_Ex_-girlfriend," Jack said automatically, then waved the argument away. Not that Catherine was wrong about the lack of regret-- he'd dated her a few times back then at Janet's urging, but their lives and concerns were so far apart, there'd never been any real potential for more. Still, they'd had fun, and he hated to see anyone so hurt by the program he'd died and lived for all these years.

"Look, Catherine..." he began again, hesitantly, not quite knowing what else to say to her.

She stared at him a moment, then shook her head and pushed away from the car. "Oh, just forget it," she said, roughly. "I know I should have called sooner-- and I shouldn't have come out here to confront you over this. I just..." she sighed. "I just..."

"I know," he replied, sympathetically.

She strode away, head high, refusing to look back.

Jack wished, very briefly, for the clarity of a field command and a P-90 in his hands again. Then he got in the car, sighed, and drove away.

--


	2. Bigger Worlds

**Title**: Bigger Worlds 

**Author**: Jedi Buttercup

**Rating**: K+

**Summary**: SG-1, CSI. _Greg Sanders makes a discovery that will decide the course of his future_. 1000 words.

**Disclaimer**: The words are mine; the world is not. I claim nothing but the plot.

**Spoilers**: Vaguely post-season 5 for CSI and post-season 8 for SG-1. References CSI 1.18 "$35K O.B.O." and 3.18 "Precious Metal".

**Notes**: For izhilzha, who requested "CSI/SG-1: Greg Sanders, Sam Carter. Keeping secrets." Not much actual Carter in it, but it acquired a mind of its own. Set in the same universe as "Collateral Damage".

* * *

Greg peeked through the open doorway into Grissom's office, hesitant to interrupt the boss-man if he was busy with something important. It looked like Gris was just doing paperwork, though, and not very interesting paperwork at that, given the annoyed frown he wore as he bent over his desk.

Good. He knocked on the doorframe and strode in, perplexing lab results clutched in one hand. "Hey, Grissom. Trivia question for you. What stable element has an atomic weight of over three hundred?"

The pen in Grissom's hand stopped moving, and he frowned, glancing up at Greg. "Over three hundred? None. I don't think they've even created any elements that heavy in a laboratory yet, and the ones that come closest are highly unstable; they decay within fractions of a second. Why do you ask?"

"That's what I thought," Greg replied, frowning down at the computer printout again. "I must have calibrated something wrong-- I was checking a DNA sample and found traces of an unidentified metal in the subject's cells."

"And it tested with an atomic weight of _over three hundred?_" Grissom raised an eyebrow. "Better double-check the equipment settings. Twice." Then he pursed his lips, glancing away in deep thought. "And if it produces the same results again--"

Briefly, Greg imagined the accolades that might come his way as the co-discoverer of a brand-new element. Then his eyes fell on the name attached to his DNA sample, and he imagined instead being locked away somewhere in a deep, dark cell without a key. From what little he knew of Lt. Colonel Samantha Carter and the project she was involved in, top secret wouldn't even begin to cover some of the science associated with it. He'd barely made it past the second interview stage, and they hadn't done much more than give him a non-disclosure form and hint around the existence of aliens and extraplanetary travel; he was supposed to give her boss a yea or nay sometime in the next two weeks.

"I'm sure it's just a mistake," he said, giving Grissom a rueful smile. Then he shook his head and headed back toward Wendy's lab, feeling the boss-man's eyes on him the whole way.

Or maybe someone else's. He jumped half-out of his skin as Nick suddenly appeared at his side, lifting the printed sheets out of his hand.

"What are you doing in the DNA lab, anyway?" Nick asked, scanning the page. "That's Wendy's job these days, not yours. Unless--" He paused, and shot an amused grin at Greg. "Still checking the DNA of all your dates?"

Greg snatched the pages back, feeling aggrieved. "And what's wrong with that? I told you before, what I need to know isn't what they look like or how smart they are, it's what's on the inside. Not that I'm actually dating this one, but--"

Nick rolled his eyes. "You know, when most people say that, they mean someone's personality, what's in their heart, what they're like without all the social masks they usually put up between themselves and other people. _Not_ their DNA."

Greg rolled his eyes right back. "You'd be surprised. Besides, it's kind of got to be a habit, and I've found out some pretty interesting things over the years. This one, though-- _not_ actually my girlfriend. She's part of that military project that wants to borrow me for awhile, you know, the one I was interviewing for last week?"

"Aw, man. You're actually thinking about it?" Nick stopped in the hallway outside Wendy's door, giving him a discontented expression. "We just got you trained up right, and you're going to let some government goons take advantage of that?"

"That remains to be seen, my friend," Greg said, and swatted him awkwardly on the arm with the results. Nick had become one of his best friends over the last few years, and one of the reasons he'd made the effort to stick with the night shift when he'd made the transfer from lab tech to CSI. Greg would hate to leave him, and Sara, and Gris, and all the others behind. On the other hand, his experience in both field and laboratory settings was exactly why the Air Force seemed to want him so much-- and pressed close to the very reason he'd taken the pay cut to get out of the lab in the first place. Every time he'd made a DNA match, his world had become a little smaller; while out in the field everything had felt-- larger. Taking his scientific expertise _off-planet_ would be even bigger yet.

"Yeah, well," Nick said, equally awkward. "Just let us know in time to plan the going-away party, okay? If we're going to get rid of you, we're going to have to do it in style."

Greg watched him walk away, feeling conflicted, then went into the lab and began recalibrating the equipment. Once that was complete, he ran the tests a second time, and then a third. Both tests came up with the same results as the first: impossible, but true.

He couldn't tell Grissom, if it really was something top-secret. But he couldn't just ignore the results, either. He weighed the printouts in his hands for a moment, thoughtfully, then deliberately fed them through the shredder and flipped open his cell phone to dial the number Carter had left him.

He knew that dialing that number would more or less make his choice for him; he knew that it would be only the first of many secrets that would require him to lie to Grissom and all of his other friends and co-workers, even after he came back from his jaunt among the stars. But the trade-offs! Greg Sanders, age thirty-two, was going to be an _intergalactic_ explorer, on the cutting-edge of research no one else would get to see for _decades_.

"Hello, Colonel Carter?" he asked, as the woman in question picked up the phone. "There's something I think we need to discuss..."

--


	3. Hypothetically Speaking

**Title**: Hypothetically Speaking

**Author**: Jedi Buttercup

**Rating**: T

**Disclaimer**: The words are mine; the worlds are not.

**Summary**: _Greg stared at the earnest guy with the scholarly glasses and intimidating biceps, trying to make sense of what he'd just been told._ 2400 words.

**Spoilers**: Vaguely post-season 5 for CSI and post-season 8 for SG-1.

**Notes**: For idontlikegravy, who asked for Daniel and either Grissom or Greg. Set in the same 'verse as Collateral Damage and Bigger Worlds.

* * *

Greg stared at the earnest guy with the scholarly glasses and intimidating biceps, trying to make sense of what he'd just been told.

"Okay, let me get this straight," he said. "You want me. To go to another _galaxy_. To do DNA work on the genome of a _predatory alien race_. _And_ help your field teams with the occasional forensic investigation."

Dr. Jackson thought that over for a second, then nodded. "Yep, that's about it," he said. "We have a lot of scientists on Atlantis, and a lot of soldiers with scientific specialties, but very few in either of those specific disciplines. Jack thinks you'd be a perfect fit, at least for a tour or two."

Greg just about swallowed his tongue as he tried to respond. "Are you _kidding_ me?" he blurted.

Jackson raised his eyebrows incredulously. "I'm sorry, is that a 'no'?"

Greg waved a hand as he struggled to pull his scattered thoughts together. "No, no. Sorry. I mean, I _knew_ there were going to be aliens and extra-planetary travel involved; Colonel Carter hinted as much. But. Space vampires? Atlantis? Excuse me if it takes me a second to adjust."

The scientist smirked a little at that. "Imagine being a member of the first team to ever step through the gate," he said. "It is a little disconcerting, to discover just how much larger the universe is than you ever could have imagined. But once you realize that most of the races you meet and most of the planets you set foot on aren't much different from what you'd find at home, it gets a lot less disorienting, I promise."

"Right," Greg said, still dissecting the contents of the guy's introductory lecture. "Because of these... Ancients. They terraformed most of the worlds they put gates on and seeded life all over the place, you said. So most of the aliens we'll meet, even the ones that weren't stolen off Earth in the first place, are pretty humanoid or at least based on macromolecule building blocks a whole lot like ours."

Jackson blinked at him, wrinkling his forehead a little. "Macro- you know what, biology was never my forte. I'll make sure Dr. Lee introduces you around that department before the Daedalus ships out with your group. But basically, that sounds about right."

"And... what _is_ your forte, exactly?" Greg asked, curious about that, too. It didn't seem likely that a base this size would have just one administrator doing orientations; wouldn't they split new hires among the relevant departments? So if this guy wasn't a biologist or geneticist, there had to be some specific reason he was the one Greg was sent to talk to. "The guy who brought me down here said you were the one who figured out how to open the gate; are you an astrophysicist like Colonel Carter?"

"Ah... no." Jackson seemed amused by that. "Actually, I'm an archaeologist by training. I also have doctoral degrees in anthropology and philology; I was hired to decipher the markings on the gate. And once we realized just how many of the worlds out there were forcibly colonized by offshoots of various ancient Earth cultures..." He shrugged. "We were fortunate to discover the translating function embedded in the gates; we can talk to almost everyone we meet, unless their brains are wired significantly differently from ours or their gate has been off the network for a long time. But that doesn't carry over to written scripts or divergent cultural cues."

"Wow." Greg's eyes widened. "That's- how does _any_ of that make logical sense?"

"The translating function?" Jackson guessed.

Greg shook his head. "Well, yes, but you're probably going to tell me it's sufficiently advanced technology that our scientists can't explain yet, and leave it at that, right?" From Jackson's raised eyebrows and expectant expression, he knew he'd hit it on the nose. "I meant, why so many cultures? Why put the tech in the gate, so it would affect _everyone_, including enemies? How can it alter the language center of the brain at all without including visual input? I mean, it's not like you hear a translation echo or anything, right?"

Jackson's eyebrows lifted still farther. "No; and those _are_ good questions. You're right, we put Clarke's Third Law through a good workout around here, and Sam despairs that we'll ever find true answers to the mysteries of crystal-based technology in our lifetime. But what do you mean, why so many cultures? I did mention that the Goa'uld used humans as a source of slaves and hosts, and that they deliberately chose low technology cultures in order to keep them easier to control, didn't I?"

"Yeah, you did. But think for a second. What was the population of Earth a thousand years ago? Five thousand years? Ten? And what's it like now? A little medical care and reliable food production, and _shazam_. Surely these Goa'uld could have provided all that without giving the colonists themselves access to technology," Greg reasoned out. "Feed 'em, indoctrinate 'em, take the ones you need and tell the ones left it's their duty to be fruitful and multiply. Like we haven't seen cults like that _here_ even without alien involvement. As long as you start out with a large enough gene pool, why would they ever need to come back? And if they're _that_ terrible at logistics, how'd they ever rule the galaxy in the first place?" He frowned at the archaeologist. "It doesn't make any sense."

Jackson's surprised expression shifted to thoughtfulness, then an acknowledging nod. "They really _were_ that short-sighted, yes," he replied, "and- badly. The smart ones came to power relatively late in the war, by which time it was largely too late for them to salvage. How do you think we managed to dismantle a galaxy-spanning empire in only eight years from a standing start? We had a lot of luck, yes; but it was more than that. You'd be surprised how few people ever think to ask those questions, though."

Greg sat a little straighter in his chair, most of the nervousness he'd entered the room with long since evaporated, replaced by his usual energetic inquisitiveness. "Well, I am a trained investigator," he said, a little smugly. _Now_ he got why they set him up with this guy: they were testing the way he thought, not his skillset. It implied good things about his future work environment; he'd seen what a universally bright, skilled team could do in the Vegas crime lab.

"And Gil Grissom is one of your mentors," Jackson nodded. "We've consulted with him before, though he's not fully read into the project; he has a very logical perspective."

"That's an understatement," Greg snorted. So _that_ was how they'd found him in the first place. He supposed he was lucky they hadn't scouted Nick or Sara; both of them had even more field experience than he did. Luckily, the DNA expertise was all his. "So that's this galaxy," he said, determined to continue with the 'orientation' instead of chasing his own nerves. "But you said villages are mostly the same size and tech level in Pegasus, too. Are the Wraith as dumb as the Goa'uld were?"

"Collectively? More or less. We believe they did keep an eye on sustainable population levels, at least until a few years ago. But since most of them were asleep at any given time, and they're fiercely competitive, not to mention virtually immortal as long as they harvest enough energy, they didn't see any reason to allow populations larger than absolutely necessary to support them. And they were even more vicious about suppressing technology than the Goa'uld.

"The Goa'uld tried to cut things off at the root by forbidding writing; the Wraith, on the other hand, were completely hands-off in their management, allowing worlds to develop on their own between cullings. But if one recovered even as far as steam power in the interim? They'd scorch the earth. They didn't care how much 'food' they wasted, so long as the 'herds' got the message. By the time we arrived, the galactic population curve had largely stagnated. And now that all the Wraith are awake..." He shrugged. "Don't think that makes them softer targets, though. One on one, their commander class and Queens have proven to be more intelligent and dangerous than the average Goa'uld."

Greg flexed his fingers a little, thinking. "Which, again, doesn't make any sense. The Goa'uld were an _active_ culture for the same amount of time the Wraith mostly spent hibernating, and they've got that racial memories thing going for them. So why'd _they_ stagnate? You think it has anything to do with heavy metal poisoning from that mineral they all carry around in their bloodstreams? They didn't, like, evolve with that or anything, right?"

"Naquadah? How'd you- oh." Jackson chuckled. "Yeah, I heard about your call to Sam. I'm not aware of any harmful long term effects in human hosts; naquadah's remarkably stable for a mineral with such a high atomic weight. Then again, we do have a relatively limited sample set, and I'm not sure anyone's ever tested a Goa'uld directly for toxicity levels." He smiled darkly at that. "We _have_ seen a senile Goa'uld before, though, and it's possible their near-constant use of the sarcophagus may correct the gross physical symptoms but only mask a degree of neural impairment. It would be... poetic if their attempts to secure their technology had only resulted in their own downfall, and it might explain a few things about the Tok'ra, too. Bring that up with Dr. Lam sometime; she'd be better able to fill you in on our body of knowledge on the subject."

"I think I will. By email, probably, while I'm gone," Greg added hastily. As interesting as the possibilities were, he hadn't signed that confidentiality agreement just so he could hole up under a mountain six hundred miles from home. Now that he knew he was headed for _Atlantis_, he didn't want to risk getting snared back somehow. "You said we get one download a week, right?"

"With the current system, yes; unless there's an urgent situation. Messages build up in the buffer, and we open the gate in microbursts just long enough to send an information stream through."

"I'm guessing the power requirements are kind of obscene otherwise?" Greg guessed.

"Enough to brown out the entire Midwest if we keep it open any longer," Jackson nodded. "So stock up on coffee and snacks in your personal package, and have your books and other entertainment media sent via transmission. Don't waste space packing game consoles or CDs."

"Speaking of coffee," Greg perked up a little at that. "Is there some kind of expedition-wide supply? Or do we have to all bring our own? And how secure are the personal packages? 'Cause I have a supply of Blue Hawaiian that I used to bring into the lab sometimes, until my boss started stealing cups out from under me. That stuff's forty dollars a pound."

"I'm probably not the best person to ask; I'll drink anything put in front of me," Jackson said, amused. "All I care about is the caffeine content. But I think it's a little of both. Email Dr. McKay- no, better try Dr. Zelenka instead, before you ship out. They'll fill you in on the current luxuries market."

"Oh, hey, that's right; if currencies are based on something rare..." Greg trailed off, wondering how many chocolate bars he could pack along with his coffee before he hit his weight limit. "Hmmm. I don't suppose you have betting pools, too?"

"Well, not _officially_..." Jackson spread his hands.

"I bet," Greg grinned at him. "What kinds of things, hypothetically, would you bet on?"

"Naquadah mines, presence of evergreen trees, whether the next culture that attacks us will have spears or energy weapons, how long until a particular team member loses his pants again..."

"Not so very different from the crime labs, except the topics are usually a little more morbid," Greg chuckled.

"Oh, I don't know," Jackson replied matter of factly. "I'm pretty sure there's still one on the books for how long it'll be until a member of SG-1 dies again; but Walter's refused to let me see it since the last time I came back."

That one caught Greg up short. "...Hypothetically?" he choked out after a pause. Was the guy joking?

"Ah, right. Hypothetically," Jackson bared white teeth at him. "Having second thoughts?"

Greg swallowed. He'd been getting the impression that for all the length of his introductory lecture, Dr. Jackson had barely scraped the surface of what Greg might run into out there. Maybe it _was_ a joke... and maybe it wasn't. But then again, that wasn't so very different from the crime lab, either, was it? He'd seen things while working with CSI that he'd have sworn were not humanly possible, both gruesome and amazing. This would just be more of the same, on a grander scale. Which was why he was here in the first place, right?

"Ah, no," he said. "I _am_ going to get a lot more reading material before I actually ship out, though, right? I'll need to be a lot more familiar with the settings, the tools, and the personalities I'm going to be working with before I get there in order to make a favorable impression."

"We've pre-loaded most of the Atlantis files onto a laptop in your quarters," Jackson replied. "And please, ask questions if you run into anything you don't understand; lack of preparedness kills more SG team members than any other single factor."

"I think I'll take you up on that, after I've had a little more time to digest," Greg replied.

"Anytime," Jackson nodded. "I look forward to hearing more about your work; I'm sure you'll make an impression out there."

"You bet," Greg said, picking up the cue that the interview was over. He stood, marveling again at the impressive physical shape Jackson was in as the guy echoed the motion; if that was the standard around here for even the soft sciences, he was going to have to spend a _lot_ of time in the gym. Nick would have been right at home.

But he'd been the one to get the invitation, not Nick.

Greg's grin widened at the thought as he shook Dr. Jackson's hand.

-x-


End file.
